Every so often I’ll have a spare moment and just happen to be sitting near the computer. It’s at those times that I visit one of the gun forums (fora?) just to see what’s up with the world. More precisely, what’s up in some very small portion of the world, one which is usually severely skewed.

One such moment happened last weekend while I was waiting for dinner to finish cooking. (Actually, I was waiting for my wife to finish cooking dinner since my culinary skills are limited to “I’d like to place a to-go order”.) I dropped in on one forum where the main topic of conversation appeared to be the emergence of flash mobs for nefarious purposes.

Up until lately flash mobs existed to do stuff like umbrella dances and public sing-alongs. I’d always found them charming in an urbanites-need-something-to-take-their-minds-off-the-cage-they’re-in sort of way, but over the last several weeks they’ve come to be used for criminal activity. It was, in hindsight, inevitable.

The discussion on this particular forum centered on how to protect oneself from a flash mob attack. It started out with a discussion of how much ammunition you should be carrying on your person (naturally there was the obligatory picture of one guy’s carry rig with the proud explanation that he’d found a way to tote over fifty rounds, ready to go at a moment’s notice.) Talk quickly devolved to OC grenades and how many of them you should have in your car. Some were even wondering if they were legal for concealed carry.

Yes, grenades. Yes, they were serious.

You can’t prepare for everything, if for no other reason than you can’t carry everything you’d need for all contingencies. Like Steven Wright says: “You can’t have everything — where would you put it??” You have to decide what are the likely threats you’ll face and pick your skills and equipment to deal with those situations. Whatever level that may be is going to be different from others, because the probabilities are dramatically influenced by your environment and your habits.

Just because some anonymous nut on a forum is carrying OC grenades doesn’t mean that you need to. Remember, a dispassionate review of the risks involved would probably lead to the conclusion that HE doesn’t need to either. Finally, keep this in mind: whatever hardware you decide is appropriate for you, it needs to be such that you can carry it all the time. Loading up for the Apocalypse on the weekend but having a .380 automatic in your pants pocket for the bulk of your week isn’t consistent, and it’s probably not congruent with the threats you’re really facing and where they’re likely to occur.

Grant Cunningham is a renowned author and teacher in the fields of self defense, defensive shooting education and personal safety. He’s written several popular books on handguns and defensive shooting, including "The Book of the Revolver", "Shooter’s Guide To Handguns", "Defensive Revolver Fundamentals", "Defensive Pistol Fundamentals", and "Practice Strategies for Defensive Shooting" (Fall 2015.)
Grant has also written articles on shooting, self defense, training and teaching for many magazines and shooting websites, including Concealed Carry Magazine, Gun Digest Magazine, the Association of Defensive Shooting Instructors ADSI) and the popular Personal Defense Network training website. He’s produced a DVD in the National Rifle Association’s Personal Firearm Defense series titled "Defensive Revolver Fundamentals" and teaches defensive shooting and personal safety courses all over the United States.